00:00It's great to be here and talk about Kahawa.
00:02Yeah, we want to talk about premium coffee and just the niche that you have carved out.
00:07It's such a really interesting category, given that the way that people consume it around the world,
00:13it's different in many parts of the world, but also the way that you've been able to partner with these
00:17local co-ops
00:18for this socially responsible product. How did you do it?
00:22Yeah, so I had a background having grown up on a coffee farm in Kenya.
00:26So my grandfather started a farm, and I'm a third-generation coffee farmer.
00:31So I migrated to the United States and saw the culture of coffee.
00:35But there wasn't a brand, like an African brand, that was essentially building the story about coffee
00:43because coffee is originally from East Africa, and we produce some of the best coffee in the world.
00:47And so Kahawa T93 is a brand that's really bringing East African coffee
00:52and the stories of the growers with it to the global world.
00:57You know, coffee, there's like so many choices today.
01:00Tell us what makes Kenyan coffee so special and so particular.
01:05Yeah, so Kenyan coffee is considered the best in the world by coffee connoisseurs.
01:09And the reason for that is because it's a very special microclimate.
01:13So we have Mount Kenya.
01:14It's right on the equator, and we have amazing soil.
01:19So all these factors converge to produce some of the best coffee.
01:23But also the farmers do an amazing job of making sure they're picking only the ripe cherries.
01:29And the way that they process, Kenya has a special processing.
01:32It's called double-washed.
01:33So they ferment the coffee for 24 hours, wash it again twice, which is unique.
01:40It's a Kenyan unique metal called double-washed.
01:42It produces some of the cleanest coffee that any coffee connoisseur, when they taste them on the table,
01:47they're able to tell that they're Kenyan coffee.
01:48I don't know if you know, but this one is a bit of a coffee connoisseur.
01:52Okay.
01:53Yeah, Carol warned me this morning.
01:54She's like, you're not going to like the coffee that they have on offer.
01:59I will drink just about anything, but this one I'm like, no, no, no, no, no.
02:02But Carol actually brings up a good point, which is about educating the consumer.
02:06Does the consumer realize the Kenyan coffee story and how good that coffee is?
02:11They got put in Costa Rica, and they're like, this is the best coffee.
02:14So help us.
02:15Yeah, so I mean that's part of the reason we have the brand with Kahawa.
02:18We're really educating the consumers.
02:20And one easy way is when they taste the coffee, they can really taste the difference.
02:24So one distinct thing about Kenyan coffee is because it's grown at such high altitudes,
02:28because it's mountainous, we can roast it really dark without burning.
02:32So you know how people say, like, burnt coffee, right?
02:35Yes.
02:35So our darkest roast, which we call our Serengeti blend, when people taste it, they're like,
02:41oh my God, this tastes very rich and dark, but it's not burnt.
02:46So that's how you know that it's a very dense bean, because it also grows for like nine months
02:51out of a year.
02:52So you get a very super high quality.
02:55People don't always know, of course, because Kenya is a newer and smaller country for coffee
02:59production.
03:00Right.
03:00But once they taste it, they're able to like tell the difference.
03:03Yeah.
03:03So there's one thing, your mission of providing a product, right?
03:06Yes.
03:07But you're also, you know, it's giving back and helping your farmers.
03:11Tell us a little bit about what you guys are doing there.
03:13Yeah.
03:14So essentially, one of the reasons I founded Kahawa was when I was growing up on the coffee
03:18farm in Kenya, I saw that a lot of the labor came from women.
03:21So up to 90% of farm labor in general for coffee comes from women, but they're not always compensated
03:27because coffee prices are always fluctuating.
03:30Sometimes they're too low.
03:31So I wanted to find a way to make sure that the women behind the coffee are compensated.
03:35So we have a QR code on the back of the bag that you can scan and tip farmers.
03:40And we have people, people love doing that.
03:42So they give tips to farmers.
03:44Yes.
03:44The way that you can tip your barista or server, you know, you send in an extra $2, $10,
03:50and that money goes back to the women farmers.
03:53Because it wouldn't be economically viable for you to raise the prices.
03:56No, it wouldn't.
03:57To then, you know, account for what you think the tips should actually be.
04:00Yes.
04:01Yeah.
04:01So it's a sense of modern fair trade.
04:03Yeah.
04:04Because in the traditional fair trade, you know, third party, the money goes back through
04:08the chain.
04:08But if we're able to send it direct and we match the tips, all that money goes back.
04:13So it's very, very effective.
04:14You've got, you shared with us some of your story.
04:16You left out parts of your story too, which is that you left an investment banking career
04:19after graduating from Harvard Business School to start this coffee company.
04:22What was the moment that you were, you know, doing the investment banking work and you
04:26said, I want to go out on my own and do this thing that's completely different?
04:30Yeah.
04:30Or go back to your roots, it sounds like.
04:32Yeah.
04:33So I was doing, you know, after business school, I started out my career in investment banking
04:37and I was covering consumer companies.
04:39So I got really interested in building my own brand, building something from scratch.
04:44And so coffee for me was a natural because I had grown up around it and I really saw that
04:49gap between like bringing an African coffee brand to the market, but also being able to
04:55solve the equity, the gender and racial equity part of it.
04:59Yeah.
04:59So it was a very, it was a problem that I wanted to solve.
05:02And I saw that my skillset coming from banking, which has been amazing to be able to utilize
05:07that as I build a company.
05:09You know, talking to someone like you, it always, you know, the perspective that you
05:13give us, because, you know, looking at the notes that your team shared with us, the farmers
05:17who get the tips, I mean, they're doing that obviously for supplemental income, right?
05:21To help out their families.
05:23Yeah.
05:23But it's educational costs for schools, for girls in particular.
05:28Like that's what this money goes for.
05:30Yeah.
05:31So one of the things I'm really proud of, and you know, last time I was Kenya, I was able
05:34to witness is a scholarship program.
05:37So the women in the community, you know, decided to use the funds to make sure that the young
05:42women in the community stay in school.
05:44So sometimes, you know, when a girl drops out of school, even for like something as little
05:49as 20 cents, it's harder for them to catch up, right?
05:53So this fund is really to make sure that the women, the young girls in school stay in school
05:58and this fund helps them make sure that they don't drop out.
06:01And I mean, I used to be in that position, right?
06:04And so being able to help the next generation of women, not, you know, be picking coffee,
06:09but actually be in school so that they can develop the community has been such an amazing
06:14privilege to be able to do that.
06:15Before we let you go, the distribution strategy for Kahawa 1893, what is it?
06:19Yeah.
06:20So we're nationally distributed.
06:22So, you know, we're Trader Joe's, you know, Target, Sprouts, online.
06:26We're the first black and woman on coffee brand to have national distribution.
06:29Of course, we're on Shark Tank, and we also have a direct-to-consumer business.
06:35We actually do serve offices in all of the, you know, New York area as well, and we're
06:42available online as well.
06:43So we're pretty diversified, and you can find us pretty much anywhere.
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